Any day now University of Minnesota president Eric Kaler will announce the names of approximately 10 individuals to help lead the search for the school’s next athletic director. Kaler announced the formal start of the search last month and his office’s website has a form accepting nominations for search committee members.
There is no shortage of highly qualified and motivated candidates that can form a blue-ribbon group. Former U athletic directors and athletes, present coaches and athletes, business leaders and other professionals offer a rich and diverse resource to Kaler if he will seek their counsel. “There is a huge talent pool,” Jim Carter said.
Carter played fullback on the Gophers’ last Big Ten championship football team in 1967. In his day the halls were sacred in the athletic building because of the school’s big time achievements in sports. When Carter was a sophomore, Minnesota was seven years removed from a national championship in football. The athletic department was a few years away from being a basketball powerhouse, and on its way to winning NCAA hockey titles during the 1970s.
These days, the glory is minimal in the high profile sports of men’s basketball and hockey and football. Decades of disappointment on the court, ice and field have become the norm with the basketball and football teams seldom able to win more than half of their Big Ten games each season, while the hockey program has often fallen behind state rivals and hasn’t produced a national championship since 2003.
Worse, the athletic department has become a national newsmaker for its scandals and other troubles. The latest woes include the suspension of three men’s basketball players. Last year the department’s negative headlines included the resignation of athletic director Norwood Teague who faced sexual harassment complaints from women at the University and also Star Tribune reporter Amelia Rayno.
Carter said his friend Tom Van Arsdale, a former Indiana basketball star, told him the national perspective of the Gophers is that they are a “laughing stock.”
“How did we get to that, from where we used to be?” Carter wonders.
The opinion here is the search committee should have a strong representation of sports-savvy individuals from varied backgrounds and interests. The viewpoints that need to be represented are those of people like Carter who are knowledgeable about the revenue-producing sports and want to see leadership demanding excellence in those programs that carry the athletic department’s brand and fuel the 23-sport, $100 million budget.
It’s an understatement to say Carter has been recommended for the search committee. “I know for sure I have over 125 nominations that have been sent to the president’s office,” Carter told Sports Headliners. “So if it’s by volume, I would guess they would have to put me on the committee, but you know…I’ve been outspoken a lot over the years.
“I’ve tried to be a truth teller—at least truth the way I see it, and it’s not been popular. I’ve been critical of Dr. Kaler and some of the people over there—so I certainly wouldn’t be their first choice, I am sure.”
Carter is skeptical about the final roster Kaler will approve for the committee. His concern is the group will be comprised primarily of people the president is most comfortable with and will include Kaler staffers, University faculty and regents, and compliant donors. How involved ex-Gophers, current athletes and coaches, and business leaders will be remains to be seen.
Another concern of Carter and others is that even if the committee has leadership committed to sending the athletic department on a mission of excellence, the final selection of the next athletic director will be made by a smaller group. Will a three or four person executive committee chosen by Kaler make the final choice of AD?
Kaler stumbled badly in hiring Teague. In addition to complaints about Teague’s behavior, he hired the inexperienced and now struggling men’s basketball coach Richard Pitino, didn’t get along with popular football coach Jerry Kill and was a disappointment in fundraising. Also under Teague’s watch the feds launched a still ongoing Title IX investigation. Title IX bans gender discrimination at federally funded schools.
Kaler’s career expertise is mostly in academics, not athletics. Carter, who grew up a passionate Gophers fan in South St. Paul and still lives in the Twins Cities, is a former linebacker for the Green Bay Packers and experienced businessman. He went to Kaler’s office in December proposing he head a small volunteer committee to conduct a search for the next AD. Instead of the University paying $125,000 for a professional search firm to assist with the process, Carter and a few others would deliver the best AD possible to the president.
“Forget a big committee of people that really don’t know much about sports,” Carter told Kaler. “Let me chair a committee and we will go find you the best athletic director to come to Minnesota and run this department, and turn it around. I will do it free of charge. I’ll do all the leg work. I’ll find the people. I’ll use my contacts… and there will be no issues with Title IX. There will be no issues with background checks that didn’t happen. We’ll get that (search) done.
“He (Kaler) just smiled and he said, ‘Well, we appreciate your interest.’
“Now you see what’s happened,” Carter continued. “Now we’ve gone to a search firm (name to be announced). We’ve gone to a big committee, and it will be fascinating to see who is on it.”
In a letter to Kaler last December Carter prioritized the most important qualifications he believes the next AD should have and that includes being a former Gopher athlete, an M letterwinner. Carter suggested such an individual “would provide immediate credibility as someone who understands the people and the culture of Minnesota and Gopher athletics.”
Carter also called for top level skills in fundraising, and for a person who believes in and is committed to recognizing and implementing the entertainment aspect of Gophers athletics—someone who “rejects the participation model and the mediocrity it produces, and understands how to intelligently invest in the fan experience for all sports.”
Teague was let go last summer and Beth Goetz was announced as interim AD on August 7. Kaler has been deliberate in finding a permanent AD. He has suggested that identifying qualified candidates will be made easier by waiting until spring when sitting athletic directors at other programs are finishing their school years. He plans to announce the name of the search firm this month and have a public review of the AD finalist or finalists late in the spring.
Carter and others wonder why the pace has been slow, particularly when the athletic department is under scrutiny and in need of a turnaround. “They’re in no rush,” Carter said. “It’s going to be a year without an athletic director in a department that is in disarray. I don’t understand it at all. I can’t imagine how they could take this long when this thing is such a mess.
“You know, we got two coaches (hockey’s Don Lucia and basketball’s Pitino) teetering. We’ve got a brand new football coach (Tracy Claeys), the jury is out (on). Attendance is dwindling. We have no brand. We have no tradition left.
“They (the administration) obviously either don’t see—or don’t care to see—the things that guys…that have been around here for 50 years see in that athletic department. I see it as a complete turnaround, a complete starting over, and yet we have waited a year to have a person in charge. I am mystified.”
Carter won’t give his AD vote to Goetz who has never been a major college athletic director. “I think she is a very capable administrator but I don’t think she is what we need right now,” he said.
Kaler might have a different view. “He likes Beth a lot,” Carter said. “I like Beth a lot. He also told me he wished she had more experience, and everyone does. I think that’s the deal-breaker for me. I don’ think it probably is for him. I think his first choice would be Beth Goetz.”
Worth Noting
Yesterday was the 10th anniversary of Kirby Puckett’s death. Puckett, the club’s centerfielder on two World Series title teams, was a 10-time American League All-Star, six-time Gold Glove Award winner and five-time Silver Slugger Award winner.
The Timberwolves made a franchise-record 68.4 percent (52-of-76) of their field goals Saturday night in a 132-118 win over the Nets at Target Center. The field goal percentage is the highest by an NBA team since the Clippers shot 69.3 percent against the Raptors in 1998.
The Class 4A boys basketball tournament starts Wednesday. Prep basketball authority Ken Lien rates the teams as follows: 1. Osseo; 2. Hopkins; 3. Apple Valley; 4. Lakeville North; 5. Maple Grove; 6. North St. Paul; 7. Eden Prairie; 8. Blaine. Lien directs the Mr. Basketball award program and the 2016 winner will be announced soon.
Tracy Claeys, now involved with his first spring practice as the Gophers head football coach, speaks to the CORES luncheon group on Thursday at the Knights of Columbus Hall in Bloomington, 1114 American Blvd. Reservations must be made by today, Monday. More information is available by contacting Jim Dotseth, dotsethj@comcast.net. CORES is an acronym for coaches, officials, reporters, educators and sports fans.
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